


“I’ll Be Seeing You” or A Little Rover’s Good Works

by WitchWayWizardry



Category: DCU (Comics), The Sandman (Comics)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-02-15
Packaged: 2019-10-29 05:41:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17802083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WitchWayWizardry/pseuds/WitchWayWizardry
Summary: Dedicated to Opportunity, the Mars Rover who worked tirelessly for more than 15 years, the NASA teams who loved them, and the millions of us who were inspired by them.





	“I’ll Be Seeing You” or A Little Rover’s Good Works

“My battery is low, and it’s getting dark.”

She sent her message and she waited. 

The little rover knew from her data collecting that she would receive a response soon. The humans had spent more than 240 days on Earth trying to help her. They sent message after message. Ever since the storm. Ever since the wind and the sand had damaged her, breaking her wheels. Leaving her stuck. 

But she continued her surveillance. She made sure to always sent her reports. She sent data on this red, rocky, rusty planet. She knew it well, she’d been here for many, many Earth years. 

The little rover sent her data to the humans. She always acknowledged the humans’ communications. The little rover knew they felt for her. Felt worried about her. So, she sent them her messages. So they would know her status.

The moments passed.

The little rover received acknowledgement of her message.

She heard a song. She knew songs. The humans had sent her songs before.

“I'll be seeing you  
In all the old familiar places  
That this heart of mine embraces  
All day and through  
In that small cafe  
The park across the way  
The children's carousel  
The chestnut trees  
The wishing well  
I'll be seeing you  
In every lovely summer's day  
In everything that's light and gay  
I'll always think of you that way  
I'll find you in the morning sun  
And when the night is new  
I'll be looking at the moon  
But I'll be seeing you  
I'll be seeing you  
In every lovely summer's day  
In everything that's light and gay  
I'll always think of you that way  
I'll find you in the morning sun  
And when the night is new  
I'll be looking at the moon  
But I'll be seeing you.”

The humans had sent the little rover a song.

She did not know “cafe” or “chestnut trees” or “wells” meant for “wishing.” But she knew the sun, and the moon, and day, and night, and how the humans had found her before.

It was time for a diagnostic, but her battery was low.

She should scan the terrain again, but it was getting dark.

——————

The wind blows. The red sands billow and roll slowly in the quiet air. The sun is bright in the sky, with two misshapen moons casting shadows on the ground.

The sands are disturbed, but not by the wind. Not this time.

Rather, by footsteps, by black, black boots. Walking purposefully, walking confidently, walking nearer the dead thing, sitting still there, nearby. The steps left no footprints, despite their disturbance of the ruddy sand.

Thin legs, clad in black pants like the boots, stopped before the little rover. A lily-white hand reached down, dusting the top of the optics off, and running fingers over and under to lift those eyes up to see.

The little rover saw the black and white woman. She saw the woman smile.

“Hello.”

The black and white woman didn’t open her mouth or move her lips to speak like other humans did, like normal humans did. Even so, the little rover received the message, and so she sent her own back.

“Hello.”

The black and white woman squatted down, and brushed more sand from the little rover’s broken body.

“You found me.”

The black and white woman nodded, still smiling, and rising back up to stand.

“It’s time to go,” the black and white woman said, but didn’t say.

“Where will we go?” the little rover asked, forgetting her wheels were broken.

“You’ll see.”

——————

The little rover saw many colors, other than red. She saw things other than sand and stone on the ground. And curiously, she could see some red sand and stone suspended in the sky. There were clouds made of sugar rather than water vapor. There were felines with feathery wings, and buildings made from bubbles. She saw things she never saw on Mars or on Earth or on the vessel that sent her from the later to the former. She wondered if these things were “carousels” and “wishing wells” and those other things she didn’t know from the song the humans sent her. She saw these things as she rolled along beside the walking black and white woman. The little rover assumed the black and white woman had repaired her wheels, but the little rover had no data of that happening, or when. Or how she had learned she could assume. And wonder.

There was a man up ahead. He was also very white. He didn’t have any black like the woman did in his hair, or his clothes. But he did in his eyes. There were stars in his eyes, like the ones the little rover could see in the sky on Mars. There were many stars in his eyes.

The black and white woman met the man with stars in his eyes first; he touched a hand to her shoulder in greeting. He smiled at the little rover. He sent his greeting without moving his lips.

“Hello, little one.”

“Hello,” the little rover returned.

“This is where we will go,” said the black and white woman, “This is where you belong.”

“I belong on Mars,” the little rover said.

The man with stars in his eyes shook his head.

“Not any more,” the black and white woman said.

“Here, you will be a dream,” the man with stars in his eyes said, “An inspiration. You will be in the imaginations and aspirations of countless mortal beings. Here, you will shape the future of Earth, Mars, and countless other worlds.”

The little rover saw the man and woman and their smiles. She heard their words. 

And she realized something:

“Then... My work was important.”

“Very important,” said the man with stars in his eyes.

“And you did that work very well, Opportunity,” said the black and white woman.

Opportunity, or ‘Oppy’ as the humans had called her, still didn’t know cafes or chestnut trees or those other things from the song. But now: she knew Pride. She felt pride. She was proud, and so were these two strangers.

“I would love to show you around,” said the man with stars in his eyes.

And so, the little rover rolled along within the Dreaming, with her two new friends at her sides.

——————

A porcelain hand pinched a page of his heavy, infinite book between two fingers. A sightless face, robed and hooded, watched endlessly as the little rover wandered seemingly alone, but in truth, with two of his siblings beside her.

The chain on his wrist jingled and clattered softly as he turned the page. But he did not need to see what was already assured. He already knew the effects the little rover have on the universe. How her work would shape the future, the destinies of humanity, and those of countless worlds to come.

He closed his book, satisfied with the ending, and continued wandering the limitless gardens of his realm, divining a path only he would know to take.


End file.
